Posted on March 28th, 2008 by Tim.
Categories: Business/The Software Industry, Tim.
Next time you’re in an interview for a technical position, try to find out the favored comic at that company. If the favorite comic is Dilbert, be on the lookout for PHBs. If the favorite comic is XKCD, you probably want to accept an offer. If the favorite comic is Garfield, I don’t know what it means, but you probably want to run like hell.
Posted on March 20th, 2008 by Chris.
Categories: Chris, General/Misc., Tim, UI Design.
[14:38] Me: http://
[14:38] Gas: lmao
[14:38] Gas: funny thing about the downslope
[14:39] Gas: the problem is that[sic] the features aren’t discoverable
[14:39] Gas: in my mind though, that’s a solvable problem
[14:39] Gas: the real problem
[14:39] Gas: is that the more features you have, the more spread your engineering effort is
[14:39] Gas: testing, bugfixes, etc.
[14:39] Me: hmm
[14:39] Me: i think they’re both part of the problem
[14:39] Gas: the first problem is an essentially UI problem
[14:40] Gas: in theory, i think all UI problems can be solved
[14:40] Me: why?
[14:40] Gas: if a person can explain what they want to do, and assuming that feature exists, then a person should be able to explain to a computer what they want to do
[14:40] Gas: this is of course at a very theoretical level
[14:41] Me: a person can’t always explain what they want to do
[14:41] Gas: that’s a requirement
[14:41] Me: ?
[14:41] Gas: if they can’t explain what they want, they aren’t going to get it no matter what
[14:41] Gas: so it doesn’t matter whether the feature exists or not
[14:42] Gas: unless we know what they’re going to want and tell them what they want
[14:42] Me: it’s like a menu
[14:42] Gas: feature != menu item though
[14:42] Me: i may want duck a la’range
[14:42] Me: but not know what i want
[14:42] Me: infinite features are possible in a restaurant
[14:42] Gas: duck a la’range?
[14:42] Me: idk
[14:42] Me: it was in a sbemail
[14:42] Me: i forget which
[14:42] Gas: lol
[14:42] Me: anyways
[14:43] Me: i could tell the chefs what i want and how it should be made
[14:43] Me: but, for whatever reason, that doesn’t work except for chefs (programmers)
[14:43] Me: alternatively, i could have a menu with every conceivable item
[14:43] Me: but that’s ridiculous - the menu would be 1 billion pages
[14:43] Me: so the menu has a limited selection of items
[14:44] Me: and makes it easier for me to find something i want
[14:44] Gas: that’s an interesting analogy
[14:44] Me: it may not be perfect
[14:44] Gas: but
[14:44] Me: but it’s something i like
[14:44] Gas: here’s another analogy
[14:44] Gas: that manages to bind the two
[14:44] Me: ooooooooooh
[14:44] Gas: so you know that gas station
[14:44] Gas: that serves the food
[14:44] Gas: what’s it called?
[14:45] Me: sheetz
[14:45] Gas: thanks
[14:45] Gas: yeah
[14:45] Gas: sheetz goes one step closer to being a chef
[14:45] Gas: rather than a menu
[14:45] Me: sheetz….umm, sheetz has a menu
[14:45] Gas: and there’s no reason it has to be a physical menu being displayed
[14:45] Me: i’ve been there
[14:45] Me: the menu is just a touch screen
[14:45] Me: and instead of asking you if you want pepper
[14:45] Gas: yes, and everything is customizable
[14:45] Me: there’s a pepper checkbox
[14:46] Me: that’s all
[14:46] Gas: ok
[14:46] Gas: now extend that one step further
[14:46] Gas: no explicit menu
[14:46] Gas: but a voice recognition system
[14:46] Gas: “i want a burger with cheese”
[14:46] Gas: adding new features clutters no old features
[14:46] Gas: it’s a UI problem
[14:46] Me: well
[14:46] Me: your UI model works
[14:47] Me: let me try and explain where it differs
[14:47] Me: lets say i’m at a restaurant with no menu
[14:47] Me: i tell the waiter i want a burger
[14:47] Me: i can order whatever i want
[14:47] Me: and there’s no limitation
[14:47] Me: right?
[14:47] Me: but, there IS a limitation
[14:48] Me: where did i come up with this idea of “burger”?
[14:48] Me: from my own head, of course
[14:48] Me: so, we’ve basically moved the set of available actions
[14:48] Me: from a screen, where i don’t have to remember it
[14:48] Me: to my head, where i do
[14:49] Me: the UI will always be simple, since it only does what i want it to do
[14:49] Me: but i’m limited by what i know how to want
[14:49] Me: http://
Posted on January 25th, 2008 by Tim.
Categories: Philosophy, Tim.
Many people argue that the world would be a better place if there was more equality. In the extreme case, equality has become synonomous with “morality”. Would we actually be better off if there was more equality?
Not necessarily. A recent slate article examines the discrepancy between black and white spending on “visible goods” (like fancy clothes, luxury car, etc). The proposed explanation is that black people tend to live in neighborhoods of other black people of relatively similar income levels (compared to that of white people). The increased spending on visible goods has nothing to do with race, but simply a result of increased tendency for “signaling”. The net result of “signaling” is that more money is spent on “visible goods” and less is spent on health care and education.
Does this mean that equality is bad? Probably not, however it certainly means there are significant unintended consequences that are highly unintuitive.
Posted on January 8th, 2008 by Tim.
Categories: Programming, Tim.
I don’t think the Hardy Boys ever had to deal with a command prompt. Evan ran into some strange problems with his environment variables, and has posted an interesting write up, markruss style.